The theme of this second Sunday of Advent is — peace. I don’t know how you feel about that. But I would suggest that we should at least ask ourselves about the appropriateness of the theme of peace today.

During the candle lighting liturgy we heard that we can risk speaking of peace, even while it’s reality can be elusive. But doesn’t the conspicuous presence of conflict in our world make the celebration of peace seem either absurd or irresponsible?

How can we speak of peace when conflict is so obvious and intractable?
How can we speak of peace when justice remains so elusive?
How can we speak of peace in the age of Michael Brown and Eric Garner
How can we speak of peace under the watch of officers Darren Wilson and Daniel Pantaleo [pant-a-lay-o]?
— If you don’t recognize these names, Michael Brown and Eric Garner, are the names of the two young black men who were killed by police within a week of one another this Summer in the United States.
Both were unarmed.
— Darren Wilson shot Michael Brown, Daniel Pantaleo strangled Eric Garner.
The states of Missouri and New York have decided that neither officer will face criminal charges for their actions.

So I ask, how do we, during this season of Advent, speak responsibly of peace?
How can we, in December of 2014, speak, without naivety or callousness, of peace?

How are we able to affirm peace when, by the thousands, people of conscience are gathering to say just the opposite?

All around the continent a robust collective voice is being raised in order to remind the world
that there is no peace,
that there cannot be peace
because there is not justice.
“No Justice, No Peace. No Justice, No Peace.”

because there is no justice for Michael Brown and Eric Garner
There will be no peace for the state that has taken their lives.
No Justice, No Peace. No Justice, No Peace.

There is more to this chant than just political provocation. There is also a prophetic resonance. If we listen carefully, we can hear in this chant — No justice, no peace, No justice, No Peace — an echo of the prophet Jeremiah, whose charge against the rulers of Judah was actually quite similar.
They had treated God’s people unjustly,
Yet, claimed that all was well,
“Peace, peace,” they said, where there was no peace.

In this age we know there is not peace because there are still those who are unjustly targeted by violence and intimidation.
Thus rings the chant raised by the masses in memory of Michael Brown:
“Hands up, Don’t Shoot. Hand’s Up, Don’t Shoot”
And if we listen carefully,
“hands up, don’t shoot, hands up, don’t shoot”
we can hear the prophetic truth of Jeremiah coming through again:
Thus says the Lord: Act with justice and righteousness, .… And do no wrong or violence to the alien, the orphan, and the widow,
and shed no innocent blood in this place.

“Hands up, don’t shoot.”
***
And so here we are: confronted with the prophetic warning against claiming a false peace.
A warning against saying “peace, peace,” where there is no peace.
A warning that comes to us both from the ancient prophet of Judah,
and from the streets of Ferguson and New York.

And yet we have come here today to recall and to anticipate the Advent of the reign of the prince of Peace.

It is worth sitting with this contradiction for a moment.

It is worth considering that that word of peace,
that word that can so often and so easily roll off of our tongues, is more than just a word.

For the word of peace that is uttered in the face of conflict and injustice can be a word of deception, or it can be a word of truth.
it can serve the status quo or it can call us to something new
it can naturalize the violence and injustice of our age, or it can expose it for the evil that it is.

***
The lectionary does not have us reading from the prophet Jeremiah today, but from his colleague in critique, the prophet Isaiah.

Our reading comes from Isaiah chapter 40, and we find here a good example of what’s at stake when the word of peace is uttered.
Isaiah does not use the word “peace,” but the word “comfort.”

Comfort, O comfort my people,
says your God.

This is a profound word of hope, of consolation, of good news, Indeed, of peace. But this word of comfort is susceptible to the same ambiguity as the word of peace.

Isaiah does not offer a generic consolation, that one might transpose into a greeting card. Prophets, as you are probably aware, are not in the business of offering cheap comfort.
This word of comfort does not come out of the clear blue sky. It comes to a particular people at a particular moment.
It comes to a people in exile
It comes to a people who have suffered violence and injustice
it comes in the 40th chapter of this prophetic text,
In case you don’t know what has happened in the first 39 chapters of this book,
it has been a blistering critique and a calling to account of this same people for their acts of violence and injustice.

This word of peace and of comfort, comes on the other side of defeat, suffering, and repentance.

This word of comfort comes to a people who are more than ready to receive it.

Consider these words from the book of Lamentations. Where the plight of God’s people is poetically described:

She weeps bitterly in the night,
with tears on her cheeks;
among all her lovers
she has no one to comfort her;
all her friends have dealt treacherously with her,
they have become her enemies.
Her uncleanness was in her skirts;
she took no thought of her future;
her downfall was appalling,
with none to comfort her.

In this context, the words from Isaiah seem all the more striking.
Israel, who has long been without consolation has finally heard the good news of comfort:
Comfort, O comfort my people,
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that she has served her term,
that her penalty is paid,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
double for all her sins.

These were, we might say, just the right words for the exiled and defeated community. Not words of cheap comfort, not words of deception, but words of truth. Words that would have been received as opening up hope and new possibility. Words of peace and good tidings.

***

As a thought experiment, consider for a moment what these words would have meant to Babylon, the powerful empire who had destroyed Jerusalem and brought the people of Israel into captivity. The political establishment within which the people of God were now living.
How would the following have sounded to them?
A voice cries out:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Now, what would these words mean to someone with a vested interest in the status quo, what would such poetry say to those who rule through violence and benefit from injustice? What a challenge these words would be to those who prefer the uneven landscape and unjust ordering of society?

No, these are not generic words of comfort or of peace.
They are hope for the hopeless
and a death knell for an unjust world.

And so, what do we do with this word of peace today?
In this season of Advent?
in the age of Michael Brown and Eric Garner
under the watch of officers Darren Wilson and Daniel Pantaleo?

I have no easy answer to that question. But I would suggest that, if we are to hear these words of comfort and of peace rightly,
we cannot ignore the situation of violence and injustice that plagues our world.

For if we imagined that Isaiah’s words — indeed that the Advent of the Prince of Peace — had nothing to do with what has happened in Ferguson or New York,
we might find ourselves in the position of saying: “Peace, peace, where there is no peace.”

It might not be our place to take up placards and join the protests, but it would serve us well, I think, to listen carefully to the prophetic resonance in the chants being raised by people of conscience.

It is our place to pray for justice, to work for reconciliation, to make way for the coming of the prince of peace. Amen.